


The Terror Rises

by leilani21



Category: The Terror (TV 2018), The Terror - Dan Simmons
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-29
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:41:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23903260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leilani21/pseuds/leilani21
Summary: This story is more heavily influenced by the original novel The Terror than by the TV show so some of the references and descriptions may be unfamiliar to fans of the show. However, I hope all fans of the core story can still enjoy.Following the demise of all his men, and joining Silna at her side in her duty to the Tuunbaq, Francis Crozier has cast away his past to start anew with his family in the Arctic. Thinking that he has left England and the navy behind his new world soon collides with the old one when he is called to assist Silna's people in making a stance to retain their lands and resources against the encroaching British Empire. Comfronted with old faces, and with the great white demon coming every closer, Crozier will soon be forced to fight in a battle for his family's survial.
Relationships: Captain Francis Crozier & Sir James Clark Ross, Captain Francis Crozier/Lady Silence | Silna
Comments: 3
Kudos: 9





	The Terror Rises

**Author's Note:**

> This story is more heavily influenced by the original novel The Terror than by the TV show so some of the references and descriptions may be unfamiliar to fans of the show. However, I hope all fans of the core story can still enjoy. This is set about 6 years after the end of the novel and is a story that has been bouncing around in my head ever since I first listened to the audiobook and watched the tv show. This is me finally letting my ideas spill out onto the page (now that I have time in this quaratine period) :) 
> 
> Enjoy! Comments are much much appreciated!

**For the purposes of this story and also because the age difference was always weird and uncomfortable in my opinion, I am aging down Crozier by about 10 years and aging Silna up about 10 (so following the events of The Terror and coming to this timeline they are both about 45 and 35 respectively)**

Crozier slowly opened his eyes staring into the sky above, shivering on the ice, his throat sore from singing, he slowly rose to his knees with a groan. Leaning over he grabbed his parka, sliding it over his head, he took a deep breath enjoying the slow warmth building as the fur encased his chest. The cracking ice a drumbeat around him. 

This was the eighth day and still the  _ Tuunbaq _ had not come. 

The longest they had ever waited before was five. Five days at the latest and the  _ Tuunbaq _ would always visit, without fail, for the yearly ritual. 

It was day eight and still he had made no appearance. 

Which meant something was terribly, terribly wrong. 

Walking back to the tent he felt his heart sink lower, lower. On approaching their sled dogs began yipping at him in greeting. Pulling against their ropes staked into the cracking ice. 

Pulling back the flap of their tent and crouching inside he was greeted by little Kanneyuk, his 7 year old daughter’s, excited squeal and hugs. It was times like these that Taliriktug was glad that she could not understand the gravity of why they were here, why they came here every year. And what was possibly in her future. 

Silna looked up from where she was cutting their left over seal meat, their 9 year old son Tuugaq assisting her, holding the meat strips tight as she sliced, her eyes pleading and hopeful. 

Taliriktug shook his head. Silna sighed and turned back to the meat, her mouth tight and pinched. 

Eight days they had been out here on the ice. And they could not remain much longer. They would need to hunt soon especially as it would be a long journey back for the children. 

And it was going well into the summer and the ice would not hold for long. While it was typical for their people to drive north in the warmer months as seal and other game returned to the ice sheets, where they were now, where the Tuunbaq had always awaited them, was too precarious too close to the ocean’s edge to be safe for extended periods of time. 

_We have to leave tomorrow,_ Crozier said speaking to Silna across their minds. She paused in the cutting of the seal meat. Tuugaq looked up in surprise. Crozier felt a tugging on his mind as their son tried to listen in on the conversation. Crozier pushed his thoughts away and Tuugaq gave a huff of frustration. He had begun learning and experimenting with the work of the _sixam ieua_ and had been communicating with his parents through their mental connection since he had been able to form full words. In their interactions with the Real People, in absence of both their tongues, he had become his parents' mouthpiece, speaking their thoughts out loud when their talking with strings was too long or difficult to translate. And even more recently, with both his son and daughter’s love of learning and curiosity Crozier had even been teaching them English; Crozier mentally feeding them the words and Tuugaq and Kanneyuk speaking them out loud back to him. It had become their own little game out on the ice, on their way to the seal holes. Crozier would communicate the sentences via their mind language and then his son and daughter would take turns repeating it back. Like with all things new, the language had been a struggle for his children compounded by the fact that they were primarily used to hearing Netsilik and the round vowels and consonants of English did not roll naturally off their tongues. With his son being older in age he naturally had grasped the language variations a lot quicker than his sister. Now they had begun practicing where Kanneyuk would repeat the sentences Crozier provided her and Tuugaq would respond in kind until one day, as they walked over to the ice’s edge, Crozier realized they had been carrying on an entire conversation without his assistance. That epiphany had made Taliriktug pause there staring at his children in wonder and happiness. Their talk was still the broken language of young children and first-time students but it was clear, confident and understandable. Crozier had stood there on the ice, the sun shining bright reflecting off of it like a thousand suns, and cried. He cried with happiness, at being able to hear his own language around him for the first time in nearly a decade, his children even picking up the slight Irish twang, their voices ringing around him. And he had cried for the voices that would be silenced in a few short years once they too gave up their tongues in the service of the _Tuunbaq._ The tears had flowed, freezing, down his face as he watched Tuugaq and Kenneyuk skip ahead of him in joy and excitement. He had hastily wiped his face and picked up the pace behind them, filing the beautiful memory away in his mind. 

It was moments like that when he felt a tug of longing for his old home, and a drowning sense of grief for the men he had lost, both living and dead, in the path to this life. But it was no use crying over an unchangeable yesterday. What was done was done. He had SIina. He had his children. They had their duties as  _ sixam ieua;  _ spiritual guides for the Real People. And for now that was enough. 

But this moment he was beginning to worry that that was not enough for the  _ Tuunbaq.  _

_ Silna we cannot stay here out on the ice, not with the shifts and changes we both have seen. We run the risk of falling through every day now.  _

Silna remained silent, continuing in her cutting of the seal meat. The children were silent, understanding that this was a serious moment between their parents. 

_ He will come,  _ Silna finally replied.  _ He must……. He always has…….why should this year be any different?  _

Crozier had no answer for that. Though…….. for some reason this year felt……..different. He could not explain it. Maybe it was the uncertainty with the great white beast not yet showing his face after all of these consistent years. Maybe it was the continually crunching ice beneath their feet. Maybe it was the unusual request from the Real People, to go so far south for the first time in …..well…...ever. 

Silna sighed heavily, laying out the strips of ready seal meat. Tuugaq looked up at her expectantly his large blue eyes shifting back and forth between his mother and father. 

_ One more day.  _ Silna finally conceded,  _ one more day and then we leave. We drive south and we meet up with the rest of the elders in time for the assembly.  _

Taliriktug nodded and retreated to sit on their bed of furs next to his daughter, pulling her in close and kissing her forehead as she played with their speaking strings. 

Crozier was nervous about this planned convergence of Real People and kabloonas (white men). The meeting was supposed to bring multiple groups of Netsilik and other native peoples together with various members of the British government and more importantly the Hudson Bay Company, to discuss new trade routes and hunting access for kabloonas. Taliriktug however knew that it was in all likelihood a farce, a show of goodwill from kabloonas, so as not to make the Real People less suspicious. To allow them access to their natural resources before outright exploiting them with complete disregard for any accords agreed upon. Crozier had seen it, hell he had been a participant in many of these types of truces, knowing the true colonial purpose behind them, and from his dreams as a  _ sixam ieua  _ he knew that it would only get worse and worse for the Real People as they were pushed further and further back from their home and their hunting grounds were depleted year after year. 

This was why, according to Silna, they needed to be there. The last time they had stayed with Silna’s relatives they had begged that she and Crozier attend the discussions in the hope he, as Captain Francis Rawdon Moira Crozier, could lend his expertise and knowledge, if not his voice (he could not, after all he had no tongue) to the proceedings. Crozier naturally was hesitant. It was an insane risk to take. He was a kabloona himself, even with his lack of tongue, visions and connection with the great  _ Tuunbaq _ as a  _ sixem ieua _ , his looks would immediately betray him. He would have to keep his face and hands obscured and covered at all times. Not to mention the children with their grey-blue, sometimes almost icey eyes, betraying their mixed heritage would immediately attract the attention of officials. It had been more than 10 years since  _ The Terror and The Erebus _ had set sail from England but if he knew anything about the Navy, while they may be slow, they were persistent. He had no doubt naval representatives would be included in the contingent of kabloonas coming to meet with the Real People, to send out inquiries about any hints to the explorers’ fates. 

Crozier was absolutely against it. But Silna and her people had begged. He knew these people. He had once been one of them. With him on their side, at minimum providing knowledge as an interpreter would be critical. In the end he had caved. Under one condition; he and Silna would keep their faces obscured by  _ Sixam ieua  _ spiritual masks and the children would wear their snow goggles at all times. Silna’s family had been relieved. In fact, they had been outright ecstatic. Maybe they could even use his presence to intimidate the kabloonas a bit, they had joked. Neither Silna nor Taliriktug had laughed. It was still an incalculable risk. To be an oddity in a crowd was to draw attention to oneself and drawing attention to oneself lead to uncomfortable questions and inquiries. Crozier would only lend his interpretations and knowledge in situations of extreme necessity and then they would leave. He would not risk his family nor the harrowing questions and possible court martial that would come from the navy discovering he still lived. It would all be a delicate dance much like the one they were risking at this moment on the ice. 

Crozier sighed,  _ come Kennayuk, time for dinner and then bed.  _ His daughter put up a small protest but she quickly gave up once the seal meat was handed to her. Taliriktug smiled watching this small domestic moment with his daughter and trying to savor it. 

_ I’ll take a turn outside.  _ Silna communicated,  _ I have sung to the Tuunbaq longer, he may return for ME.  _

Taliriktug knew that that was a petty jab at him but he understood that it came from a place of pain and frustration. He sat in silence on the furs of their bed as his children ate, staring at his hands. It had been years since he had prayed to his old god, in the vestiges of the Catholic faith. Based on everything he had been taught, raised on, this was blathsemy what he was doing but he could not help it. The lives of his family and the Real People depended on the  _ Tunnbaq  _ being appeased and kept at bay and he and Silna were the only ones that could guide him. 

_ Dear God, please let him come………...soon………  _ Francis Rawdon Moira Crozier begged, to an old god he had long forgotten. It was probably useless; praying to one god for assistance with another, both of whom insisted that the other did not exist, but he was desperate. They needed to leave the ice and head south. 

He felt a tug on his sleeve then and looked down to see his son looking up at him expectantly, a piece of seal meat held out as an offering. Taliriktug smiled softly, his heart touched by the small innocent efforts of a child. 

Crozier smiled with a sigh of defeat and accepted the food; chewing the blubber around the stump of his tongue. That was one thing he still could not get used to after all these years. The expectation of taste that never came. 

_ Time for bed children,  _ Crozier communicated firmly. Understanding that there would be no compromise with his mental tone the children quickly divested of their parkas to bury under the furs of the elevated bed. They were fast asleep by the time Taliriktug joined them, after checking that the fire had enough whale oil to sustain it through the night; for when Silna returned. 

  
  


Several hours later Crozier woke up to a dark room, his breath coming out in puffs of vapour. 

The fire had done out. 

Looking to his side the children were still buried under the furs; their breathing even and deep. Silna however, was nowhere to be seen. His heart racing he quickly grabbed his clothes, hopping and hobbling towards the tent flaps as he tried to pull his parka on. 

Stumbling outside he quickly spotted his wife. She was bare skinned, her head thrown back to the heavens as she knelt on her furs, singing to the skies. No matter how many times he witnessed her perform the ritual, no matter how often he performed it himself, he was always struck dumb once the sound hit him; the sound of vocal cords vibrating, grating, and rolling over each other, creating an unworldly sound that felt as raw and old as the ice itself. 

Crozier slowly lowered himself to sit on the ice, his bones aching with the cold and old age. 

He waited, shivering, as the ice cracked and screamed around them. In the background he could hear the sled dogs yapping and sniffling away around the tent. This was all drowned out by Silna as she continued to sing, her vocal cords rising and falling as she beseeched the great white beast to make an appearance. 

Suddenly she stopped and Taliriktug finally looked up from where he had buried his head in his parka hood. His wife was silent now. Her head in her hands, no longer turned to the gods above. 

She was shivering. 

Getting up Crozier quickly walked over to her side, the snow and ice crunching beneath his feat announcing his approach. 

Picking up her parka top from where it lay next to her, he draped it over her shoulders, encircling his arms trying to warm her icey skin and bones. 

There was a layer of frost in her hair. She had not stopped since cutting the seal meat for the children’s dinner. 

Taliriktug hugged her tighter, feeling their minds touch, sharing her sorrow and disappointment. 

Sharing her fear. 

Suddenly a great sob fell from her chest. Silna gasped, looking up at her husband, tears in her eyes. 

_ Why has he not come? What is wrong? What did we do wrong? _

Taliriktug was silent once again, wiping away the tears in her eyes before they could freeze in the Arctic wind. 

_ I don’t know  _ Crozier replied honestly, this was the first time in all their years as  _ sixam ieua  _ the  _ Tuunbaq  _ had not appeared. And he had no answer for why. 

Together they held each other on the ice, Crozier trying to provide what little warmth and comfort he could. Suddenly a crack shot up in the ice next to them, causing them to jump in surprise. It was not a large one but still small chips and snowflakes still went flying bouncing and melting into their warming furs. 

_ We cannot stay any longer  _ Crozier implored  _ it is time to go south. He is not coming. We must deduce he has another purpose for us this year.  _

Reluctantly Silna nodded, her teeth chattering over the howling wind as it kicked up thin sheets of snow on the ice. Supporting each other they stood as Taliriktug helped her into her furs and back to the tent. Lifting the blankets of furs he coaxed her into bed next to the children. 

_ Rest,  _ Crozier insisted,  _ just a few hours and then we can break camp and prepare the sledge.  _

Shivering Silna nodded, her body shaking with tremors from the cold. 

_ Rest and all will be well  _ Crozier promised, though he knew he was wrong to give such false hope. But that was all they had left after eight days on the ice. 

Hope. 


End file.
